Early WWII USN Naval Action - Four Stacker (USS Edsell), The Dancing Mouse takes on the IJN!

The early war USN Pacific actions stand between heroic, tragic and those that stray into the foolhardy. Caught strategically off guard the American (and ABDA command in particular) found themselves in precarious positions, consider the plight of the four stacker USS Edsell (see below, it seems that the most interesting posting in the USN in 1941, was one in teh Asiatic Fleet [please click link below]): 

https://www.history.navy.mil/about-us/leadership/director/directors-corner/h-grams/h-gram-067/h-067-1.html

This picture tells a thousand words and helps one to appreciate the enormity of the mismatch (see below, the last photograph of the USS Edsell [please click link below], those are 14" [battleship] and 8" [heavy cruiser] shell splashes): 

https://www.history.navy.mil/about-us/leadership/director/directors-corner/h-grams/h-gram-003/h-003-6.html

A more worrying interlude from the present, history in the making, is this Orwellian edict and disclaimer .. makes you think you don't know what you have got, until you lost the lot! They are going to put that tree in a Tree Museum.

Content on this website has been revised or removed to align with the President’s executive orders and DoD priorities in accordance with DoD Instruction 5400.17 “Official Use of Social Media for Public Affairs Purposes.”

Recommended by a Friend: Dr Jim Greer at the Maneuver Warfare Symposium.

On my "To Do List" to watch: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bS-YSz9LkjA

Airfix Lightning IIB

I was visiting my local model shop. I really wanted to make a purchase, but I was struggling to find a "pocket money" sized treat for myself. That is an infrequent purchase bouncing around the £10-£20 mark that is not a major purchase. I looked and looked but was about to give up hope. Then I saw an Airfix starter kit of the new RAF (RNAS?)  Lightning IIB that is supposed to be equipping the Royal Navy's  HMS Queen Elizabeth CV and maybe at some time in the future HMS Prince of Wales CV [or just a spare trans-shipping deck?] too (see below. she is a quirky looking bird but like the Typhoon I should really get one and find an unused piece of ceiling to hang it from): 

By making a model it always helps you spot and identify a real one in the sky, if it pops up quick out of the blue on a spontaneous fly by!  

Map of Ukraine 1943/44: Strategy and Tactics 118 - The Tigers are Burning

Although this is an old S&T Ziplock game from way back when (in 1988, when I had stopped wargaming, RPG's and the like, foolish child that I was, instead my head was full of  busy computer science undergraduate stuff). The territory and the underlying terrain are now all too familiar subject matter for students of the 2022 to 2025+ Russo-Ukrainian "Continuation War" (see below, since 2014 this has been fought over between these two protagonists, before that there was the Second World War, before that the Russian Civil War, before that the First World War, before that the Russo-Turkish War, before that the Crimean War and it goes on and on): 

Not sure at all how history will play this one out!

Board Game Geek Link: https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgameversion/28271/strategy-and-tactics-magazine-edition

WW2 Naval Convoy Theme .. Mixing the Pot of Ideas

It all started with a Waterstone's book token left over from Xmas, or rather a Xmas present looking to be used. Whilst in store I was looking around and saw Max Hasting's Operation Pedestal, this I had already listened to on Audible but thought that a hard copy would help me plan for a naval miniatures game (see below, everything seems sensible just now, the narrative of the battle is good, but sadly when I got it home I felt a little short changed on maps and orders of battle that the wargamer seeks out):

Sitting nearby was another beguiling book, this time on the Arctic Convoys and with a recent take on operational decision making by the Admiralty based on information from Bletchley Park and its Enigma decryptions (see below, the "pair" nicely finished off the book token, job done - one a "Hot" sunburn Mediterranean campaign, the other a "Freezing Cold" ice chipping off the railings Artic campaign weather, Mother Russia here we come!):   

The fun started when I got back home and rummaged through my existing book and game library coming across "Hunting The Beast", trying to kill the Tirpitz and then a recently "gifted" Arctic Convoy game from Avalanche Press (see below, the map inside it is an absolutely beautiful masterpiece): 

I have a few more books that cover the action in the Mediterranean (see below, all bought with the intention of getting my Navwar 1/3000 Italians to fight it out with the RN and the odd Free or Vichy French ship thrown in for good measure): 

There was still more fun to be had in the "Wargaming Library" - Paddy Griffith's classic Sandhurst Wargames book includes a very detailed "Sink the Tirpitz" style game (see below, I like many other wargamers I know possess at least one copy of this [quad] game, but still do not have all the pieces for all the games, as it really needed to come in a box - alas it is now out of print despite it being a classic): 

Although not as beautiful as the Avalanche Press Artic Convoy map, the Sandhurst Wargames maps are still very functional and "interesting" especially the one detailing the fjords of Norway. Given that these were the days when we did not have Google Maps on tap, when it was produced this was a very enigmatic addition to any wargamers collection (see below, one interesting part of the game is that there are many ingenious ways [FAA, RN surface action, X-Boats] in which you can try to sink the Tirpitz and her companions - not saying you will be successful at any of them. I don't think getting the RAF's 617 Squadron to drop Grand Slams on her, as in the one that worked, is actually one of them):   

This is all "settling or stewing" in the back of my mind, where the wargame scenario idea "mixing pot" resides.

Roger Penrose on AI

Fascinating listening:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=biUfMZ2dts8

Welcome to the Jungle: Purple Haze - Vietnam Tactical RPG

I was closely watching this game (Purple Haze) , having spotted it a long. long time back and although I did not step in at the Kick Starter phase I joined the fan-base when I pre-ordered it through Zatu Games (after too much sitting on the fence). It is Vietnam, it is very atmospheric, the playing material of of great quality, the mechanisms look very intriguing and apart from the game itself (that looks so good) it meshes with my existing 20mm kit and in the end it was just too good not to get (see below, can you hear the Hendrix guitar rifts and "All along teh Watchtower" kicking off in the background? I can"): 

The unboxing took quite a lot of time, this was a very heavy box! Elements of it will also graduate to teh tabletop.

Interesting Talk by Professor Stephen Rosen: Warfare and AI

Video: Oxford University Physics Department

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8PILXCpkBc8

Books:

• One: Winning the Next War: Innovation and the Modern Military
• Two: Via the Internet Archive - Societies and Military power: India and its Armies
• https://archive.org/details/societiesmilitar00rose
• Three: War and Human Nature

Other - Oxford University Physics Department Videos:

https://www.youtube.com/@departmentofphysics0xford

1/3000 WW2 RN Destroyers bulk basing!

The WWII RN Destroyers get their basing call and proudly get squished together like the good mates they are, or rather the sisters they are (see below, they have been waiting in that box a good few years for this treatment):  

These range from early to mid war, where possible (according to budget) I like to get all of the iconic classes like the Tribals.

Chessboards that are of a Global Nature: The Important Place of Ukraine has as a Playing Piece

I was fascinated to hear repeated from several sources a comment from a presidential advisor called Zbigniew Brzezinski. He reported to the US President Jimmy Carter in teh 1980's, and stated the importance of Ukraine to Russia. Simply put without Ukraine, Russia cannot call itself an empire, with it, then it can. Ukraine has (or at least had) 40 million people, while Russia 140 million, but Russia desperately wants to claim these 40 million as its own, as well as the strategic importance of the land and sea access (see below, perhaps Brzezinski can shed more light on how Russia and America "really see the rest of the world"): 

I will have to read "The Grand Chessboard" the old fashioned way with the Mark One eyeball!

Footnote: The date of paperback publication I am reading was back in 1997, last century. I feel old saying that!

The Essex Class - Basing the War Battle Winners

Their time has come, the war winning class of USN aircraft carriers which made it simply impossible for the IJN to get back into the war after Midway. Fast Carrier battlegroups dominated the 1944-45 Pacific Theatre of Operation (PTO) in TF 58 (see below, these are eight of the beauties that came crisply from teh Navwar 1/3000 moulds):  

Sadly Navwar experienced mould degradation and the remaining nine (see below) I received needed some tender loving care (TLC) in the form of the miracle Vallejo Plastic Putty. Navwar discontinued the mould shortly after I placed my order (several years ago now), but Davco still do a 1/3000 model (see below, my seventeen [of a total class of twenty four] that were commissioned during WWII (see below, it may seem slightly obsessive, but blame the appeal of the Orange Conway encyclopaedia and Avalon Hill's "Victory in teh Pacific" - and in one sense having started collecting these models some twenty seven years ago, in for a penny in for a pound):

From late 1942 onwards the USN replaced the CV fleet she had going into teh war more than twice over which is simply phenomenal. A strategic Pacific Game seems destined to follow in teh footsteps of War Plan Orange at a future Conference of Wargamers (CoW). Some sea texturing and model painting is needed before then though. 

That Games Workshop Balrog!

Yes, there must be thousands of well intentioned purchases of the GW Balrog figure when "The Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring" came out at the cinema and simultaneously hit the Games Workshop retail outlets. Yes, someone, with the gift of the brush, was assigned in each shop to paint the Balrog and told to "do it right" because it was going to be the centrepiece of the shop window display for the next six months (see below, my beastie was assembled years ago - no mean feat in itself and primed grey but got "stuck" in limbo):

But .. as good as the casting techniques were back then, figures of this size and complexity were always  "gappy" at the joins, so my Balrog has stayed many years imprisoned in a box awaiting the Milliput treatment, but alas the thought of rolling two pieces of epoxy putty together (the brown one always annoyingly harder than the green/yellow one) makes you want to run to the kitchen and "make a cup of tea and get very distracted from rolling Milliput" (see below, the next stage - gap filling, not Milliput but Vallejo Plastic Putty to the rescue):  

Vallejo Plastic Putty was an impulse buy, yes I have many plastic kits that would benefit from it, but if truth be told, for the, majority nobody would notice on the wargames table. The enigmatic bottle winked at me but was not put to great use, until one day teh urge took me to find the Balrog. Close inspection of a large fantasy figurine like the Balrog at a RPG (inevitably playing D&D) session is embarrassing though and it why this figure was put to the back of the painting queue (see below, horrid gaps and I mean horrid gaps at last being filled, even Sauron was smiling. The Plastic Putty is squeezed out in controllable amounts that can then be applied by cocktail stick or end of a modelling knife):  

Well if any of my D&D player characters from my ongoing campaign are looking in, firstly "Hi - stop peeking! No good will come of it!". Secondly rest assured I would not be so "mean" as to do something as "mean spirited" as introducing a large, dangerous, short tempered and obviously "too high a level" monster (with quick-kill player character eating potential) into the game, just because I have painted it, What do you take me for? Yes, of course I will quite happily wait twenty odd years until you are ready to tackle it. Please pay no attention to the Bugbear and Demon Prince figures that did that, appearing out of the natural course of events, we call those regrettable incidents, so unsightly. That was plain "mean" and I have learnt my lesson (which was go out of the room before starting to laugh out loud). Carry on, there is nothing to see here, move along Gandalf. 

Twilight 2000 or is it really Twilight 2025?

What I have recently acquired having missed it first time round in the 1980's I decided to get the "reboot version" (see below, a seemingly innocuous pile of gaming material seems to be steadily growing): 

But anyone reading the news lately can be forgiven for thinking it is more like (see below, an ad-hoc bespoke to the game cover): 

We seem to be talking about the same part of the world!

Audible Books: Miscellaneous

Reading, or rather listening. On the history front I decided to broach my general ignorance of the Middle East (unless the battles of Rommel and the 8th Army count) of which I know very little, just the complex and disturbing pictures I see on the TV news. So I took an Audible recommendation of "Arabs" by Tim Mackintosh-Smith (see below, it helped that it came free with my Audible subscription [win-win], and it was very comprehensive, or rather it was very, very long [going back to before the Arab date "dot"] so although I do not remember "everything" I got the satisfaction of a "general feeling" and understanding of the 'diaspora of meaning' that the word Arab evokes - simply put no one interpretation will ever suffice):  

Following on from this I chased up on another recommendation form a friend that takes a very close look at the troubled history of Palestine, Syria, Iraq and Lebanon courtesy of Britain and France's colonial history in teh region, after the fall of the Ottoman Empire. Aspects of "The Great Game", which really should be entitled, "Be Very Careful For What You Wish For!" It was both deeply informative and deeply troubling, to extent that it just left you shaking your head in disbelief (see below, "A Line in the Sand" is a terrible read because it lays bare the worst part of human nature and international politics - (one of) the moral of the story being don't leave a French and British career diplomat alone is a room of a map of a country that is not theirs and really know squat about to draw a line on a map, between alcoholic drinks, coffee and pastries):   

Needing some "light relief" from the blood letting and treachery from the folded, furrow of deep history and cynical realpolitik's, I called out to my friends for more lighter recommendations and got something I would never have chosen myself (see below, a fantasy detective story set in the modern day, to my escapist delight I really enjoyed it and can see myself slowly walking through the series): 

Refreshed from the non-hard historical journey (although with a deeper appreciation of how many rivers there are in the London whereabouts) I took up my final recommendation (I do have "free will" too, honest. This one was with a slight game inclination, aka Science Fiction, set in a universe that most people who have played or tinkered with Traveller would recognise. Think "Merchant Prince" but working your way up through from the bottom, after life has dealt you an unexpected "bad hand" (see below, "Quarter Share", another series I think I am now hooked into following):  

Given my liking of the book and genre, I have been collectively told it is high time I started watching "The Expanse" on Amazon Prime while I still have the chance.

Final Note: I would recommend all of the above, but for very different reasons!

USN WW2 "Heavy Metal" Battleships 1/3000

The USN certainly had a lot of heavy metal on the books at the start of WW2. Admittedly most of it was left in a re-conditioned burning state after the Pearl Harbour attack (rebuilding if not sunk), but the pre-war building program brought on stream some very useful battlewagons in 1942-43, critical certainly for Guadalcanal operations (see below, Pearl Harbour "targets" left and being the "pre-war new design stream" as in the North Carolina [2] and South Dakota [4] classes [and a hypothetical USS Montana] on teh right):  

Late 1943-144 the "new breed" of Iowa class ships started arriving, along with the rebuilt boys who had caught it at Pearl Harbour (see below, column one being the Pearl Harbour and Atlantic Fleet, column two being the "reconstructed" Pearl Harbour battleships [the ships serving in the Atlantic avoided this indignity], column three being the "pre-war new design stream" as in the North Carolina [2] and South Dakota [4] classes [and a hypothetical USS Montana] and finally column four the scary 16" Iowa Class [4] and Alaska [2] large cruiser/battlecruisers):  

This is a phenomenal industrial ship building production rate (something the IJN could not think of matching), considering it was alongside the construction of the Essex class fleet aircraft carriers (a total of seventeen during the war and seven more shortly after in late 1940's) and there was also the ten Independence light aircraft carriers. Build baby build was obviously the US motto! 

1/3000 WW2 USN and IJN Destroyer Basing

There are big ships and there are small ships, but in the end (or rather to start with) they all have to be based. With this in mind I turned to a dusty pile of "silver shame" and did the task that wargamers like the least .. started basing (see below, these are IJN Destroyers that now at least have started on their journey to the wargame table - there was quite a lot of them): 

Most of this kit came from both sides came from the Navwar Philippine Sea Battle Pack (which I bought at the start of this century, ahem), but both sides have also been supplemented along the way to fill gaps, particularly going back to some of the early Pacific War battles in 1941-42 (see below, flotillas of USN Destroyers): 

I thought I would give a shout out to some destroyers that caught me eye, the valiant survivors of the USN Destroyer Fleet of WWI that through long service saw "two world wars" (see below, the US Wilkes class - nice little models): 

These destroyers were also famous for making up practically all of the "50 Destroyers" (aka the "town class") transferred to the RN to help fight the Battle of the Atlantic (so technically I could happily use them for two navies, USN and RN). More basing and organising to follow!

Old IJN 1/3000 friends, time for Basing and Painting

My old IJN 1/3000 friends .. the battlewagons of the Pacific War, mostly (that is all apart from teh Yamato class) reconstructions and modernisations of their WWI battlefleet (see below, a bit fuzzy but they are all there in various stages of "production"): 

This is what I am aiming for (see below, IJNS Nagato [1936]):  

I think the sea effect and final whiter highlight on the decking and light grey on the superstructure works well. 

Skytrex 1/200 - KV2 Model

This (KV2) has been been on my Barbarossa 1941 (1/200 scale) wish list for a long time. It is the eternal frightening tank (along with its sister KV1) that the Germans encountered in 1941 and was looked upon with a sense of awe and arcane wonder. It was usually photographed with a German Landser looking at or standing on a knocked out or abandoned example (see below, stage one "flash removal"): 

It almost looks like a sensible tank in 1/200 - its insanity shows up more in 1/76. I remember I needed two of these for one of the Spearhead Scenarios. It was a "bunker buster" (a child of the 1940 Finnish War requirements for getting through the Mannerheim Line) rather than a true MBT, but it looked like a prehistoric monster. 

Note: That closes off my 1/200 - 1941 Russian Tank wish list, but for 1942-43 opens up my need for T60, T70 and lease lend vehicles (M3 Stuart, Valentine, Matilda, M3 Lee, Churchill, Tetrarch  - methinks I would need battalion batches of ten for each of these, apart from a singleton for the Tetrarch).  

What "Another" Sherman .. this time 10mm from Pendrakon

As part of the props for the Wargames Developments (WD) Convention Demonstration Game 2024 of Arnhem (1944), I decided I needed to paint up a Sherman tank. I needed a relatively small one, ignoring the fact that I had several suitable models already (15mm and 1/200), I thought it appropriate to use a Pendrakon 10mm Sherman V seeing as the game was going to be ran at their Battleground Show (see below, the Sherman faced off against a Stug IIIG and some German Infantry moving up a linear battle track/ladder): 

It went together, four pieces, no flash, fitting in tightly together with a tiny bit of filing. 

The painting scheme was:

• A grey primer (Airfix Acrylic 001), with a Vallejo Brown Dipping Wash liberally spread into the cracks. 
• Next an undercoat shade of (924) Russian Uniform Green.
• Base layer of 50% Olive Grey (888) and 50% Russian Uniform Green (924).
• Final highlight Olive Grey (924). 
• Tracks matt Black (950) and dry brushed Gun Metal (863).

I planned but epically failed to put any decals on it but I did manage to put it on a base (not shown above) which took more time than I thought, hence no decals!

Note: The Sherman faced against the Stug III shown in an earlier post (click link)!

Just a Shout Out to the Podcasts I have been listening to [BBC Americast], [The Atomic Hobo], [Wargames, Soldiers and Strategy] and [Anything But a ONE - Adventures in Historical Miniature Wargaming]

 A shout out to these gents and ladies for making my life tolerable while doing DIY (kitchen painting) and washing the dishes (and given in no particular order or merit, I like them all): 

• BBC Americast: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/brand/p07h19zz
• The Atomic Hobo: https://shows.acast.com/atomichobo
• Wargames, Soldiers and Strategy: https://wsspodcast.libsyn.com/
• Anything But a One! Adventures in Historical Miniature Wargaming: https://anythingbutaone.buzzsprout.com/

Adding a new one: 

• BBC Ukrainecast: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/brand/p0bqztzm

iPhone "Pacific War2 Game - Nice Little Time Waster

This is not a simulation or accurate representation of Pacific Warfare, but it is a lovely timewasting piece of fun that is a little bit like a battlefield problem solver, with nice graphics that give good representations of the ships I am currently basing and painting in 1/3000 scale (based on the Microsoft Unity 3D game engine). It is an old game running on an old iPhone but gives me screen time fun (see below, sadly the IJN saw to it that this USN Essex class carrier did not make it through the war): 

I have already done the journey from Pearl Harbour in Hawaii, across the Pacific to Japan as the USN, so I am return tripping back from Japan back to Pearl Harbour as the IJN, hence the screenshots of sinking USN ships (see below,  a USN Baltimore class cruiser is now no more): 

What can I say, I like moving the ships around the seas shooting them at each other, the "variable range" estimation means that even when a ship has radar you can miss, though as you "go pro" it becomes a shooting gallery. The thing I have hardest trouble with is that the carriers start the game under the guns of enemy battleships and cruisers. Yes that is really silly (and not Pacific War), but it is the same for both sides. However, seeing as the Human Player goes first, you at least go down fighting, and if you can get another ship closer to the enemy it takes the pressure off. The AI is poor which is why it is nice to play it. The US gets a Gato sub which is lethal (and an atom bomb as a shock weapon), but the IJN player gets long lance torpedoes, Kamikaze and the Yamato. The hardest task the IJN player has to do is sink the US sub with a destroyer (depth charges), thankfully after the "beginner's series of scenarios" the US just show up with big surface things (cruisers, battleships and aircraft carriers) things which you can easily see and hit!

Verdict: I can recommend it for its "therapeutic" value because nine times out of ten you will win.

52 Fletchers - 1/3000 Navwar

Dating back to the time I bought "The Battle of the Philippine Sea" Battle Pack from Navwar, I always had a few of these destroyers to base. It came to pass that now, was the time I had some time and inclination to do it (see below, I now have a harbour full of US Destroyer, 52 Fletcher Class ones to be precise): 

Stage one complete, got them out of the packaging, filed down bits of flash and then superglued them to a 20mm by 60mm card stock base. Good for the soul if nothing else. As you can see bottom right I have taken two all the way (for a different project) but the other 50 have to play catch up! 

There are many "Wargaming Blogs" but then there is a "Blog of lots of Wargaming Blogs"

http://wargamesblogs.blogspot.com/

Over 1,500 to date, is your favourite there?

Hello 2025 and I am Hoping it will be a Good Year - Social Media New Years Reduction Resolution (Working so far) and Enjoying Sharp Practice

The first thing to say is that a New Year's resolution to cut back on Social Media (aka senseless nattering and mindless scrolling) seems to be working. I am off "Twitter", aka "X", and feel none the worse without its "wear and tear" of the soul. With some hesitation, nay trepidation, I took down "Facebook" but again, the bark was much worse than the bite of its passing. I may listen to the news on the radio slightly more, but I find "filtered" news far better than the "chasing the unvalidated story" elsewhere - it takes less time too out of my day. "WhatsApp" and "Messenger" are survivors though only because of the personal connection to people on the groups and the ability to arrange wargaming play dates. Blogging has taken a back seat too! I have rediscovered 28mm Napoleonics (see below, my [borrowed] French troops v Renko's Austrians, my fine Voltigeurs fending off the Austrian formation in the act of deploying): 

So in getting out and about slightly more in January/February I have picked up this Sharp Practice itch. It is very contagious. I am playing with other people's toys at the moment, but I have unpainted Perry's and Victrix 28mm French (1812) and British to field two infantry sides, with small attachments of cavalry and artillery. I do like the combat system, but am less interested in winning the Two Fat Lardies "game within a game" than seeing if the basic mechanism of "shock-killed-morale" plays fair with the period (see below, the weight of fire delivered by the Austrians is simply too much): 

So much so the French decided to go home early. I think it played the period very well. I have to say it was also the friendliest Napoleonics game I have ever had, because from past experience, Napoleonics brings out "the worst in the rules [national characteristics]" and "players interpretations of the rules [ways in which the national characteristics have to be used to win]". Played two games so far as 1812 French, lost them both, but had a great time, which is a good sign IMHO.